The Green Medium is an Emerald Award-winning, youth-run blog that seeks to innovate how we discuss and inform ourselves on environmental concerns.

Dec 21 Making-Up: New Year's Resolution

I’d like to give a public apology to every animal I’ve hurt indirectly because of my daily routine. From putting on my makeup to taking it off, I’m appalled at the amount of brands that are not cruelty-free or have even switched BACK to testing on animals. Vegan products are becoming more and more widespread as people shift away from animal cruelty. As someone who uses makeup on a pretty much day-to-day basis, I’ve started to realize that putting harsh chemicals on my face every day will probably cause only harm in the long term– even if I think I look good for now. It’s also extremely depressing to find that some of my holy grail products are killing animals. It’s hard to switch a routine that you’ve been stuck with for years and years, but if it only benefits your face and animals, why not make the change?

Unfortunately, I can’t say that as of right now all of the makeup products that I use are vegan and cruelty-free but it is a definite New Year’s Resolution of mine to wipe-out the non-cruelty-free products.

Many brands that are proponents of vegan and cruelty-free makeup also have sustainability commitments. As gorgeous as some makeup packaging can be, the majority of them aren’t good for the environment– from processing to disposal. I wish it were just as easy to send a strongly-worded email to the CEO’s of these companies and tell them the benefits of switching to cruelty-free methods and sustainable packaging, but money is money and people only want to make it. With that being said, the difference that you and I (if you use makeup) can make is switching to makeup brands that don’t support things like animal testing. Boycotting products that do so makes these companies lose customers one by one and in the end will leave them wanting more business. Then maybe, just maybe, they will look into spending a little more money in order to help animals and the environments.

Cruelty-free products are wonderful and the next logical step would be vegan makeup. Veganism is great for the environment since supporting livestock makes up a very large portion of greenhouse gas emissions. You can read more about it in another Green Medium post here.

Some brands that I swear by and are cruelty-free are:

Urban Decay Cosmetics - VEGAN!

NARS- Not vegan

Laura Mercier - This company states that it is cruelty-free but it is undeterminable since they do not have certification, not vegan

I sure do love makeup, but I happen to love the environment more. That's why I've made it my goal to change the products I'm using as of right now. Hopefully, this helps push you to change products or congratulate you more if your makeup bag is already vegan and cruelty-free.

- J :)

Some links to lists of vegan/cruelty-free makeup lists and websites and why you should go vegan: